Notchless Wiregates

[*Chris*]

Black Diamond is now manufacturing affordable notchless wiregates. Nice. Bout' time.

[Dom]

It still has a notch. Looks like crap but probably works exactly like a notchless with the gimmicky ''stainless steel wire hood''.

[*Chris*]

I think that the wire hood acts in the same way as the integrated hood on the WC Heliums. I understand the Heliums were an expensive process to forge. This looks like an equivalent solution to the snagging issue. We'll see I suppose.

[Murph]

At first glance this appeared to me as a "locking wiregate" where the wire around the notch could be moved to lock the gate in place. Regardless, this it is a clever way to reduce snagging and the cost.

[Adam]

nothing like nestling your wire in a hooded notch.

[chossmonkey]

I think that the wire hood acts in the same way as the integrated hood on the WC Heliums. I understand the Heliums were an expensive process to forge. This looks like an equivalent solution to the snagging issue. We'll see I suppose.

The design also leaves a place for ice and other debris to clear through. Good solid gated notchless biners have a hole in the back of the gate to do the same.

[Leehammer]

Not sure if anyone has seen this

Looks like kind of a cool idea but probably irritating as hell to rack.

[Murph]

You could do the same thing with a short twig that you can find on the ground to hold the gate open. That's if you remember to do this before leaving the ground and don't pop it out on your way up or if you. I guess the same would apply to this set up. Also, the trigger would likely get snagged on things if the biner is inverted. I would be worried that the rope would slice the if it got snagged between the trigger and the spine. Too gimmicky for me.

[Brian!]

I bought one of these in December. I haven't used it yet (not cool/rich enough for ice gear), but it looks pretty groovy. I got tired of using twigs for stick clipping and fighting so the biner would actually clip the bolt.

The "trigger" part is spring loaded, so it will always lay flush with the side of the spine or holding the gate open. Short of getting a magic twig in there it's not going to snag any ropes. I find it's a really solid design and don't understand why it hasn't come out until now, but then again, I'm weird and enjoy ease more than I enjoy $10. I guess that makes me a gimmicky climber.

[chossmonkey]

I find it's a really solid design and don't understand why it hasn't come out until now, but then again, I'm weird and enjoy ease more than I enjoy $10. I guess that makes me a gimmicky climber.

It has been done several times before. Its a slightly different design but the same concept.

It is just too specialized and unnecessary so they never stick around very long. They were first intended to make hard clips easier. The down side was having to reload the biner each time which usually ended up being much harder than the clip.



As to stick clipping, why not just build a real stick clip with a painters pole or light bulb changing pole and spring clamp? For sport climbing I never go to the crag without it.